


Foss in therapy, part 3

by belmanoir



Series: Foss in therapy [3]
Category: Kyle XY
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-01
Updated: 2012-04-01
Packaged: 2017-11-02 20:52:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,638
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/373219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/belmanoir/pseuds/belmanoir





	Foss in therapy, part 3

"I thought maybe today we could do something a little different," Nicole said.

He looked at her warily.

"I want to directly address your discomfort with therapy. If you're able to identify for yourself some the root causes of your anxiety, it might help you to deal with them." She waited for a reaction. "What do you think?"

"Fine, whatever."

"I'm going to list a few common issues people have with opening up. See if any of them resonate with you."

He hunched his shoulders and nodded. This was getting to be worse than going to the dentist.

"All right. A lot of children, especially boys, are discouraged from expressing emotions. They're taught that talking about feelings is a sign of weakness, that it's embarrassing and inappropriate." She waited. "Then there are people who are afraid of opening up because they're afraid of rejection. They're afraid that if they reveal who they really are, people won't like what they see. They believe that to retain approval, they have to hide the truth." She tilted her head and watched his face. What did she see? "If you told me the truth, really opened up and told me about your life, what do you think my reaction would be?"

She'd never let him near the kids again. He raised his eyebrows at her and shrugged.

She nodded as if that meant something. Then she said, "Have you ever spent much time around young children?"

He swallowed a lump. "Yeah."

"Children have limited autonomy. Have you ever seen a child who discovers for the first time that he or she can say 'no' to an adult? It's a revelation. They say it again and again, just to prove they can."

He remembered that from when Sara was about two. It had driven him crazy, but he'd been secretly proud, too. No one was ever gonna be able to push his kid around. He blinked and nodded.

"Some people refuse to answer questions about themselves as an assertion of autonomy," she said. "Especially if their boundaries haven't been respected in the past. By monitoring and denying access to their intimate selves, they regain some of the control they feel they've lost."

He watched his hands.

"I'm going to ask you something. You don't have to answer if you don't want to, but...have you ever been captured and interrogated?"

She thought he had PTSD from MadaCorp. Like he would have been fine with letting her walk around in his head before that. Still, she already knew the answer. "Yes."

She nodded. "And did you break?" she asked gently. This time she waited for him to answer. The clock ticked and his shame built and she was really going to make him say this. Four minutes. Five. Six.

"Yes," he bit out. "But they didn't get anything about Kyle. They were just taking the chair for a test drive." There was another long silence. He didn't know if he was supposed to say something else. He looked up and her face was white.

"You're talking about Madacorp. I--I thought when you were in the service--" She swallowed.

Did she really not remember?

She pressed her lips together. "I just didn't think. I was so relieved that Kyle was all right that I--" He slid the box of Kleenex towards her, but she shook her head, the blond ends of her hair quivering. "I'm sorry, I'm being very unprofessional," she said in a stronger voice. "Anyway. Do you want to share any thoughts with me about anything I just said?" 

He didn't.

"Then I have a proposition for you. Tell me one thing. One real thing. The worst thing you've done, or the worst thing that's ever happened to you. And if telling me is as bad as you think it's going to be, you can walk out and never come back."

He waited for the catch. "And this is on the honor system."

She smiled at him. "It's very clear that you hate being here. But you're making a good faith effort because Kyle and Jessi are important to you. I really admire that. I think you'll tell me the truth. Do we have a deal?"

He could just say no deal, and they'd be back to this stupid drip-drip-drip. But the drip-drip-drip was safe. This could get him out of therapy for good, but it could also backfire if she really didn't like what she heard. In the end, he was decided more by his restlessness than anything else. He didn't like waiting. He was ready for a fight. "Deal."

She leaned back and waited.

There were a million things he could have told her, but of course--damn her for being right--he told her the thing Madacorp had asked. "I killed my wife and daughter. I was driving drunk and crashed the car." He waited, palms sweating, for her reaction. For her pity and disgust, and her bullshit. For his cue to get the hell out.

"I am so sorry," she said instantly. Then she waited. "When did this happen?"

"Ten and a half years ago."

"Have you talked to anyone about it? Really talked?"

He shook his head.

"We certainly have our work cut out for us," she said wryly.

That was it? He stared at her. "Wha--what the hell is wrong with you people?" he sputtered. "You know what Kyle said when I told him? He said 'It doesn't matter'! What--I just--I don't understand what's wrong with you!"

She leaned forward. "It matters," she said intently. "I have children. I know how much it matters."

He didn't want to feel calmer, but he did. His hands settled back in his lap.

"Mr. Foss, I'm a therapist. I can listen to you. I can help you understand how you feel, and why you feel that way. If one day you decide you want to feel a different way, I can help you work towards that. We can try to identify patterns of behavior or emotional response that may have contributed to what happened. If you're struggling with addiction, we can talk about that. I can help you find a sponsor or a group. What I can't do is judge you, or punish you, or forgive you. That's not my job."

The thing was, he got that. He didn't judge his clients either. He did his job. The rest wasn't his business. 

"Do you want to talk more about the accident now?"

He never wanted to talk about it. But now she knew, he was pretty sure he didn't have a choice.

"Thank you for sharing that with me." She set her legal pad down on the table. "I know it was difficult. As a reward, why don't we cancel the rest of your session? I have some ice cream in the freezer, and we can talk about what the kids have been up to."

He stared at her. He didn't understand what he was feeling. Relief, obviously. Surprise. But also, undeniably, disappointment. Like he'd wanted her to keep pushing. Like he'd wanted to tell her. This was more dangerous than he'd realized.

"After I was injured last year, I was in physical therapy for a while," she told him. "I hated it. It hurt. But I knew it was helping me heal, and I trusted my therapist to know my body's limits."

His mouth twisted skeptically before he could stop it.

"This is like that in some ways, but not in others. Sometimes what we do here hurts. Badly. That's part of healing. I've been a therapist for a long time. I can make a pretty good guess about when to back off and when to push. But nobody knows your limits and your boundaries like you do. You are in complete control of what happens here. If I'm hurting you and you want me to stop, you can tell me that, and I'll respect it. I won't treat every piece of information you give me like the thin end of a wedge that I can use to crack you open. This is a difficult and uncomfortable process, but we're on the same side. We'll get through it together."

He nodded awkwardly and held the door open for her. The ice cream was Ben and Jerry's, which always had too many flavors going on in one carton, but he ate a few bites to reassure her and listened to her talk about the kids' school stuff. She asked if he'd met Jessi's new crush (he hadn't, but he passed along the results of his background check) and listened to him explain his plans for the trampoline he'd bought for the kids. 

Not until he was on his way out the door did she sigh, chew on her lip, and say, "There's something I have to ask you."

"What?"

"I'm crossing a line," she said despairingly. "This is why you should have looked for another therapist."

"What?"

"Are you sober? Please be honest with me." She watched him carefully.

He nodded. "Ten years."

She relaxed. "Thank you. It's just that you drive the kids, and spot for them--"

He tried for a reassuring smile. "Don't apologize. It's your job to protect them."

She smiled back. "It's our job. Thank you. Will I see you next week?" She sounded as if she cared about the answer. As always, he wondered how much of it was a professional skill.

He could lie. He didn't. "I'll be here."

She beamed at him. It was another thing she and Kyle had in common, the way her smile made you feel warm. "I'm glad to hear it. And next week, I'll shut up and let you do the talking."

He gritted his teeth and tried not to look forward to it.


End file.
